Axis History Forum

This is an apolitical forum for discussions on the Axis nations and related topics hosted by the Axis History Factbook in cooperation with Christian Ankerstjerne’s Panzerworld and Christoph Awender's WW2 day by day.
Founded in 1999.

Something I learned this week was the 1st woman to be awarded the KVK 1 with Swords.
This was awarded for service during the terror bombing of Hamburg in 1944, organising the services of the Frauenschaft to the assistance of the civil population, organising food supplies and soup kitchens, temporary accomodations and even utilising semi damaged and unusable railway rolling stock [something like 90 vans and wagons] as shelter and a kindergarten/homeless childrens accomodation in the railway district!

Matt,
That buttonhole knot looks to me like a KriegsVerdienst Kreuz second class with swords. If you look closely it has the wide dark stripe in the center (Black on the War Merit Cross ribbon) and on the knot in the centre you can see some device--which would be where the little metal swords would be on those knots.
Those little buttonhole knots for that Award are common...such an award was given to women, and see she has the first class award so naturally she would have the second class as well.
Can't think of another award knot it could be that would still look like that in the photo, plus you know she would be wearing that one.

The site with the wonderful German name "Das Krankenschwesternbroschenmuseum" ( http://home.arcor.de/el-conejo/) has a lot of interesting pictures of nurses's decorations but only little comment unfortunately.

Bes regards
Torsten

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Last edited by Heimatschuss on 03 Jan 2007 21:22, edited 1 time in total.

this may be a bit off topic but as we're talking about decorated women here's a photo of Viktoria Savs visiting Germany (about 1935).

Viktoria Savs was the only female Austrian frontline soldier in WWI (at least in the German part of the army). She was born on June 27th, 1899 in Bad Reichenhall (Southern Bavaria). When Viktoria was aged 4 her mother died and she joined her father who was living near Lake Garda (southern border of South Tyrolia) by then. When war broke out in 1914 her father joined one of the elite 'Kaiserjäger' regiments and was badly wounded in the border battles with the Russians. After recuperation and with the Italian attack pending he became a member of the Tyrol militia. Viktoria, not wanting to leave her father alone again, buggered the authorities so long that Arch Duke Eugene of Habsburg finally agreed that she could join the militia under the name 'Viktor Savs'. She entered her father's militia battalion (Landesschützenbataillon Innsbruck) in June 1915, only a few officers knew her real identity. First working in the hinterland as a mule guide and courier she was later admitted to frontline operations too. On May 27th, 1917 she was caught in a rock fall caused by artillery fire. A boulder hit one of her feet almost completely severing it from the leg. When admitted to hospital and being prepared for leg amputation her real gender became known to a wider circle of people. After the amputation she worked for the Austrian Red Cross during WWI and excelled there too.

After she'd lost a leg she must have received the Casualty Medal (Verwundetenmedaille) also.

Vikoria Savs died in Salzburg (Austria) on Dec 31st, 1979.

Does anyone of you have further information on her, especially her role in WWII? As the picture indicates she was not a total opponent of the Third Reich but I did not find anything on her life after WWI on the net.